As it is getting close to the very centre of Bristol, the Railway Path meets with many obstacles, roads with heavy traffic load and railways are facing the route, reminding the two motorways that had to be crossed before accessing the agglomeration. Those infrastructures stand as a second bypass system, this time touching the city centre. This observation allows to say that the city, constituted of a core and then of a suburb, is discontinuous. The urban borders are clear: roads are firstly crossed at the interface between the core and the suburb, secondly crossed at the interface between the suburb and the countryside. Those ruptures are broken through from below, under bridges, unspectacularly. Located in a pit, the path is quite ignored by the city that only give to see a decor of factory backyards, and logistic areas. The centre is indeed surrounded by an industrial dirty ring, and so the population density will paradoxically decrease as the camera moves on, and as the space gives away its residential vocation. The human presence is still signalled by some reference to the actual that can be seen here: political stickers in the context of the Kill the Bill movement, English flag on the occasion on the football euro. The take part to the city fabrication and break with the place desertic atmosphere. Right after the first collective housing building has appeared, the path finally dilates to form a large park, as would a river find its outlet by metamorphosing into an estuary. The cycle path continues beyond but will now be inscribed in the road network, this is the end of the reserved lane.
The relation with the city suddenly changes as spatial rebalancing occurs. The pedestrian doesn’t any more benefit of the integrality of the space and see a massive part of his good being taken away from him and be given to the driver.
A last crossroad with very heavy traffic loads obliged the crossing to be underground before the Castle Park is reached. This garden is a protective barrier, a buffer strip that allows a soft transition between the loud service area preceding the leisure and consummation area that the city centre is. The cyclable itinerary is still present even if the National Cycle Network is now drowned into the local grid: the fact that it is the route to Bath can’t be guessed. AT the extremity of a vast pedestrian esplanade, the camera reaches some steps facing the floating harbour water, whose expanse visually interrupt the path and give a conclusion to the film.